Re: language design and Optimization techniques

On 26/04/19 09:33, alexfrunews@gmail.com wrote:
> In this day and age it is a shame that the language that is still very
> much alive does not provide the programmer with easy-to-use (and
> implement!) tools to perform/handle:
  > ...
  > Often times the desired functionality is already in the CPU


I agree 100%. My guess is that manufacturers of CPUs which
did *not* have a certain feature lobbied to have the feature
removed from the language. The resulting compromise
is a minimal intersection of features with 199 cases
of undefined behaviour when agreement cannot be made.


For a language which is supposed to give access to the "bare metal",
C provides very little.


We should be designing languages for people to use and then designing
CPUs which can efficiently compile and execute these languages.


I have quoted this before, but it bears repeating:


"We shall do a much better programming job, provided that we approach
the task with a full appreciation of its tremendous difficulty,
provided that we stick to modest and elegant programming languages,
provided that we respect the intrinsic limitations of the human mind
and approach the task as Very Humble Programmers."
-- E.W.Dijkstra, ACM Turing Lecture 1972, "The Humble Programmer"


> P.S. this should've probably gone to some C group.


I think that C is beyond hope and therefore this is definitely
the most appropriate group!


--
Martin


Dr Martin Ward | Email: martin@gkc.org.uk | http://www.gkc.org.uk
G.K.Chesterton site: http://www.gkc.org.uk/gkc | Erdos number: 4
[C is close to the bare metal if the metal is a PDP-11 or maybe a GE 635.
Other than that, it's an abstract machine of, as we have seen, highly
debatable similarity to the underlying hardware. -John]

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